Archive for June, 2012

A short little post this Saturday, very sincere, with no snark at all. (I hope.)

I read a lot of “mommy blogs” (which I still have to put in quotes because I rather loathe the term, but that’s what words do — they let you know what I mean — and these are the words that have been attached to these kinds of blogs so I’ll use them.) There are pretty much always comment sections in these blogs, and many of these comments are, in a word, craa-zyy! Whatever a mom is doing (feeding her infant, diapering her toddler, working, sleeping, eating, etc.) the way she is doing it is completely moronic and criminally wrong to a sizable percent of the population — at least the population that reads and comments on mommy blogs.

I’m behind the trend in reading Fifty Shades of Grey but I’ve been reading other stuff (see the “Books I love” box to the right) and doing other things (like raising a pair of wild 16-month-old twins). But there was some chat about Fifty Shades among my Facebook friends recently, which prompted me to write this post. In this case, one woman’s trash is definitely another woman’s treasure — and another woman’s “whatever.”

A few weeks ago I had a bad case of the summer fashion blues in which I lamented my post-baby body and grumbled about the skimpiness of summer clothes and longed for the courage to wear some of the quirkier outfits I saw at Cindy Sherman’s exhibit at the MoMA in New York. Then, back home, I spent an afternoon spying on hipsters in one of my city’s cafes, and again I wished I could be braver in my fashion choices, that I could be more into the idea of an outfit and not worry so much about how it actually looked. But I know myself. I know I’m most comfortable in a basic uniform of jeans and t-shirts. I don’t like to wear jewelry (I’m so out of habit that now it physically chafes me) and it’s too hot to wear scarves. So that leaves me with odds and ends: shoes, bags, watches. (Does a watch count as jewelry? Well, not to this wrist.) I have plenty of bags, and this spring I bought a slim red-banded watch (inspired by Anna in Beginners) but my summer shoe situation was pretty bleak — mostly flip flops, most of them the $3 kind.

Anna and her watch in Beginners; I greatly admire her tomboy style (and Ewan McGregor is a nice accessory too)

So on Thursday, while the twins were napping, I plunged into the rabbit-hole (more…)

In my last post (Having it out with having it all) I wrote about Anne-Marie Slaughter’s recent article in The Atlantic, “Why Women Still Can’t Have It All.” I said that she had some terrific points, but I didn’t elaborate on them. You should read the whole article, but here is a quick summary of the things I thought were particularly smart:

A suggestion from an assistant of hers: “MAKE SCHOOL SCHEDULES MATCH WORK SCHEDULES.” How amazingly different would a working parent’s life be if this were the case?

Slaughter’s list of “The Half-Truths We Hold Dear”:

Slaughter writes:

Let’s briefly examine the stories we tell ourselves, the clichés that I and many other women typically fall back on when younger women ask us how we have managed to “have it all.” They are not necessarily lies, but (more…)

I mean, I have no intention of it being a lifestyle blog but it is about my life, which — like any life — is lived in a certain style (and I don’t mean rococo).

I’ve been reading about lifestyle blogs lately and I’m kind of puzzled. I must admit that I hadn’t thought much about them until a friend and fellow blogger called my attention to the genre — blogs that write wittily about domestic tasks and show gorgeous photos of homemade meals, decorated rooms, naturally handsome spouses and charming children but without even a hint of expired milk, dust bunnies, morning breath or tantrums. But these blogs are everywhere and, evidently, painful reading to many mere mortals who aspire to this kind of unattainable perfection. (more…)

(If you’re thinking about a play kitchen of your own, this one is a bit of a chore to put together, but the instructions are the best I’ve seen for this sort of thing and — if you’re like us — you probably have some Ikea allen-wrenching under your belt — which makes the whole task a piece of cake.)

Many, many thanks to my dear friend who got this for us. She had loved her own play kitchen as a child and insisted on getting one for the twins. We — my friend and I — spent considerable time online looking at play foods with which to stock said kitchen. One twin seems to like carbs (the slice of bread, the pile of spaghetti), while the other little carnivore favors waving the grilled chicken breast around; they squabble over the glass of milk (which they pretend to sip and then bust out with a big “ahhhh” of satisfaction) (it’s pretty adorable).

Now when the twins finish eating breakfast I close the kitchen doors and let them loose, dodge the little chairs they like to push around — and their walker-cart, often full of plush vegetable toys and sometimes a stowaway monkey — and (more…)

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A bit about me …

I'm Randon Billings Noble, an essayist and book reviewer, who is also the mother of now three-and-a-half year old twins. I don't post here as much as I used to, but you can read my published writing and hear my writing news by clicking the link immediately below (which will take you to my writing website, randonbillingsnoble.com). Thanks!

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